Tuesday, October 28, 2008

This post explain how to make a Leopard (hackintosh) secondary install bootable, any computers that has more then one OSX86 installd have a primary install and secondary install, a secondary install can be install on USB driver, Disk-On-Key, another partition, as long as you can boot more then one OSX86 on that computer, that means that you will load the working OSX86 and from there repair the non-bootable OSX.for only and primary install read this post.

please note that this proccess will work for MBR and GUID partition scheme, if you don't know what this means, or want to learn how to check which of the two partition scheme you have then you can read this post.

in order to make your secondary partition bootable, please follow these next steps:1. boot into your working OSX86 partition2. download this file and extract it, for this post i will extract it in the root folder / so now i have a folder named: /MakeBootable3. make sure you know what partition scheme you have (MBR or GUID)4. open terminal (Applications->Utilities) and write the following commands5. sudo -s (and write your password)6. cd /MakeBootable (this is the folder you downloaded and extracted at step 2)7. diskutil umount force /Volumes/Leopard(replace the word Leopard with your non-bootable drive name)

the result should look like this:

Volume Leopard on disk1s1 forced unmounted

if you don't know the name of the drive (that is non-bootable) then you can write this:mount -t hfs

then you get a list of all known drives in your system the result should look like this:

8. now write the command:dd if=./mbr/boot1h of=/dev/rdiskXsY bs=512 count=1(replace the letter X with your non-bootable drive number and the letter Y with your non-bootable partition number, in this example it will be: rdisk1s1)also if you have MBR partition scheme then leave the word mbr as written in the example, if you have a GUID partition scheme then write guid instead of the mbr word then it should look like this: dd if=./guid/boot1h of=/dev/rdiskXsY bs=512 count=1

(replace the letter X with the number of the non-bootable disk, in this example it will be 1 then for this example it should look like this: disk1)also if you have MBR partition scheme then leave the word mbr as written in the example, if you have a GUID partition scheme then write guid instead of the mbr word then it should look like this: dd if=./guid/boot0 of=/dev/diskX bs=400 count=1

(replace the letter X with your non-bootable drive number and the letter Y with your non-bootable partition number, in this example it will be: disk1s1)the result should look like this:HFS+ filesystem detectedLooking for 1 word freereading 4096,4096Marking word 196writing back 4096,4096allocated blocks 32 at start 6272

now the disk should be bootable and should be able to boot on his own, you may do the steps in this post or this post as a completeing procedure in order to make sure that the OSX is the first partition to boot from.

Sunday, October 19, 2008

how to make a primary installation OSX partition bootable?sometimes you are going to need a solution for a non bootable partition that was previousely bootable or after successful installation the partition remain non-bootable.

please note that the solution sugested here is for a primary installtion, which means it is for the main and only OSX installation on your computer and you have no way to boot into another OSX system. although it is possible to restore a secondary OSX installaion to be bootable again using this method, there is a simpler solution and it is described at this post.

primary installaion = the first and only OSX installation on your computer.secondary installation = second (or greater) installation of OSX type (means you have more then one OSX installed on your computer) a disk-on-key/external USB/Firewire drive can be considered a secondary installation for this matter.

also note that this post is for MABR partition scheme (and not for GUID partition scheme). if you don't know what MBR or GUID partition scheme means then please read this post first.

in order to make an OSX86 partition bootable follow these next steps:1. boot leopard DVD into Single Mode (you can red how to do that here)

2. type the next commands at the command line:cd /usr/standalone/i386ls

the result of these two lines should be a list displaying all the files in the i386 folder,please make sure that at least these files exist:boot0boot1hboot_v8startupfiletool

if these files does not exist they can be copied from the installation DVD, in order to copy the files from the DVD use the method explained in this post. the files can also be downloaded from here.

3. if this is the case then type:dd if=./boot1h of=/dev/rdiskXsY bs=512 count=1(replace the X letter with the drive number that the OSX is installed on, the first drive is 0 the second is 1 and so on. replace the Y letter with the OSX partition number, the first partition is 1, the second partition is 2 etc. example: my computer has only one drive so my drive number is 0, and i have windows installed on the first partition and OSX on the second partition, so my OSX partition should be 2, therefor my parameter should be: rdisk0S2)

you should see an output result similar to this:1+0 records in1+0 records out512 bytes transferred in 0.008498 secs (60250 bytes/sec)

4. now type this command:dd if=./boot0 of=/dev/diskX bs=400 count=1(replace the X letter with the OSX drive number, first drive is 0, second drive is 1 etc. also please note that it is diskX and not rdiskX as the previouse command)

you should see an output result similar to this:1+0 records in1+0 records out400 bytes transferred in 0.018606 secs (21498 bytes/sec)

5. type in the next command:./startupfiletool -v /dev/diskXsY ./boot_v8(replace the X with the number of the OSX drive and Y with the number of the OSX partition)

you should see an output result similar to this:HFS+ filesystem detectedLooking for 1 word freereading 4096,4096reading 8192,4096reading 12288,4096Marking word 510writing back 1288,4096allocated blocks 32 at start 81856

now the disk should be bootable and should be able to boot on his own, you may do the steps in this post or this post as a completeing procedure in order to make sure that the OSX is the first partition to boot from.

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

i know that i have been away for several month from the blog, but in my defenece i have to say it was for the greater good, i took the time to create a hebrew blog and a forum that helped a hundred people or so, small group, i know, but in israel it is alot.

i wish to revive this blog but i am thinking of writing more on mac related issues tips, tricks, applications review site spoted etc. ofcource that i will also write posts regarding hackintosh, the thing is that hackintosh subjects are hard to find since most have been written and covered allready, most of my work is support people through email or forum, i have decided to add donation button so it will keep me motivated, if you find my work helpfull please consider donating, i hope i can help you guys more this way.

if you wish you may send me mail and request issues to cover on the blog, kind of a wish list, also there are about 4-5 mail i received and yet to answer but be sure i will get to them on the comming weekend.

thanks guys for reading this blog, drop me a line and let me know what you like most about it.